NSW public library wiki

Ian Greenhalgh (Armidale), Kylie Vella (Castle Hill), Andrea Lovell (Parkes), and Michelle Head (Albury)

RSVPs: Sally Walters (Big Sky); Adelin Moir (Bellingen); Kathryn Breward, Katrina Shillam, Danielle Gates, Annette Schofield, Victoria Keane, Monique Buchbach, Louise Tyrie, Tracy Sowell, Jacqui Hinshaw, Edmund Shillam (Clarence; Ngarie Macqueen, Taryn Kelly (Richmond Valley); Catherine Johnston (Coffs Harbour); Ellen Forsyth (NSL) Present via BlueJeans = Lindy Allen (Macquarie), Cherie Dickinson (Ryde), Kira Paznikov (Central Coast), Thomas MacRae (Georges River), Rebecca (Kiama), Kate (NSL), Krupali Tevar, Anne Lorie

speaking via video conference about embedded librarians including some examples from public libraries.

Embedding the library in the user experience, without expecting them to come to us Embedded librarian – from embedded journalist Embedded librarian – article by Barbara Dewey – first article, context of academic libraries, but we can’t rely on people coming to us, but embedding librarians and library resources will make libraries more valuable to the institution – bibliography at the end of the slides

Embedded librarians are about showing value in the community, to the community

• Sometimes librarians in the embedded model are not interchangeable - whereas different staff can do different desk shifts
• Embedded librarians often focused on the individual librarian getting out in the community, building relationships, harder to swap in an out
• Embedded librarian project based on deep understanding of the needs of the community, talking with community leaders, activists, really understanding the needs of the community
• Library model often based on based on people coming to us, embedded is based on bringing services to the people, being immersed in the organisation, embedded, acting as and contributing as a member of the community
• Key is building relationships and building partnerships
• This is a challenge as people need to leave the library, library services reference desk statistics show a 10% decline in the USA in one year (need to look at local statistics)
• People less likely to think of asking librarians now, 80% of questions brought to USA librarians were easily answerable by other library staff
• Douglas Library tested their library answers statistics, to show that 85% could be answered by paraprofessionals (maybe need for local study on this)
• How to maximise the expert research skills of librarians
• Lorcan Dempsey blog post In the flow 2005 – talking about the need to get into library user work flows
• For university students – online university students use their learning management system as how access to the library and other parts of their campus
• Embedding librarians in online classrooms is one way universities have used this method
• Importance of tailoring of resources and of access – examples of embedding library instruction into online courses, and embedding content into a class – where it may not be seen as coming from the library
• Exploring personal librarian model in some courses, following up with tailored instruction so that students can associate the library with a person not as an intimidating place

Transferable lessons

• Never underestimate the importance of consistent visibility, being at meetings, being at involved
• The more people see someone from the library, people think about involving a library
• Small things can lead to big gains –
• Start with a pilot
• Know your boundaries – expectations can be high, so need to be clear about boundaries
• Hard to swap in to cover an online discussion board, can be hard to sub in people to meetings
• Sometimes it does not work – learning from disasters, and being willing to take risks

To get started

• Research your community
• Maybe a survey on community needs, but also look at local reports (council and other organisations), maybe interview key people in community to explore needs, what organisations have similar goals to the library, where the library can be useful to those organisations
• Prioritise which group/s to embed in, high impact for the library and high impact for the group
• How would work with this group benefit the library? How hard will it be to join a committee? How to priorities (helpful chart in talk)
• Think about being a member not a visitor, do a pilot, try with a couple of groups
• Embedding is about becoming a member of a group so you are contributing to their goals
• Some libraries have using embedding to support local businesses groups – it can be able giving talks to different groups, but that is often a starting point, not an end in itself, participate in business events (like some libraries are doing with homelessness connect)
• Consider working with local co-working spaces – can provide consultation to co-working spaces, or really work with how people are using the library – bring the knowledge from embedding back to the library
• Social service agencies – boards and advisory groups, librarians can do great research to assist the committee
• Partnering with local technology groups– potential for going out from libraries and providing information

Community reference

• Popups at farmers markets, celebrations, proving evidence based information at events – building on existing work
• Relationship building is important so we learn more about our communities and can take this information back to the library to change our services to better meet the needs of the community

Assessment/evaluation

• Need to work out the benchmarks at the start
• What will success look like
• What is the opportunity cost – doing something new, what will you have to give up, are the benefits worth the costs
• Focus on the outcomes, and the impact on the community
• Collect stories from stakeholders – think about the impact on the community which goes beyond numerical value (maybe QLD methodology)
• Some of this work takes a long time for the relationship building to bear fruit, can be hard to know if you are successful in s short time

Case studies Deschutes Public Library, OR

• New director, ran focus groups to learn more about community needs
• Aim to get reference librarians out in the community– rebranded as community librarians
• Go to civic organisations – now have librarians in more than 60 organisation

Douglas County Library CO

• Director had a vision
• Librarians interviewed community leaders
• “Hi I’m… from the library. I’m here to hear more about your organisation and how the library can support you in your goals
• Sent out in pairs
• Started small – librarians to attend one meeting a month – and staff could choose which to attend,
• Integrated into the groups, member, not outside
• Demonstrated value through action, not marketing
• Library staff provided key research to county staff and other organisations
• (look for article Leaving fort ref)
• Douglas County collect the information they are learning, track on a blog, this information informs the library – the gets around the information being siloed,
• Embedding changed peoples perceptions of the library

Considerations for the embedded librarian

• Long term project, needs a visible presence
• Work required confidence, relationship building
• Ask what the library can do
• Focus on stakeholder goals – not about the library agenda
• Might require shifting hours
• Informal opportunities can be fruitful
• Watch out for how much time it takes, watch for scope creep/set boundaries
• Share information with others at the library – not silos

For managers/leaders

• Radical change is hard, pilots may be more palatable
• This work takes times, support the staff
• ‘personal’ librarian model can be hard on staffing
• Scalability can be a challenge
• Lack of interchangeability can be a challenge
• Develop and evaluation plan before you start

For administrators

• Librarians can’t do everything, internal service and outreach both important
• Team based structures, nimble, responsive
• Results of embedding can be uneven

Need to allow time for results, and allow time to build relationships

• Unordered List ItemBe persistent and helpful and it can lead to valuable collaborations

Value in recording work already being done in the area of embedding – so can track and report on it

Including in position descriptions

Meredith Farkas' slides

and do a 2 minute presentation on it – and share the citation/link

• ALIA online – workshop on developing a community engagement tool kit, obtaining information from a librarian in Kent, to capture community outcomes, to build storiesinvestigating digitation strategies – Queensland State Library framework http://www.plconnect.slq.qld.gov.au/manage/21st-century-public-libraries/digitisation
• council website – promoting e-recourse making more visible on website, looking into Ebsco host resources on their website, looking at how can provide access to online newspapers
• Incite magazines (ALIA) – example of article on information design, available online see https://www.alia.org.au/publications-and-news/incite
• Example of digital story telling, thinking about how the technology can be used and how to get children writing their own stories, https://storyboxlibrary.com.au/stories/my-country/
• “Digital storytelling plays an increasingly visible part in our daily lives. Mobile technologies and apps put the tools to capture and create stories into our hands every day and some organisations are also exploring ways to use storytelling via online tools to engage stakeholders. As the Shanachie team from “This Week in Libraries” often remind us, the mission of libraries includes the goals to “keep stories, make stories, share stories”, increasingly many of these are digital stories.” http://www.5minlib.com/search/label/Ready%20to%20Go%20Book%20Display library blog of ideas that can be quickly skimmed through, Information wants to be free https://meredith.wolfwater.com/wordpress/ and blog at National Library of Australia https://www.nla.gov.au/stories/blogs
• Cloud library application, cloud library use
• Techsoup https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ajxyero5cz0 Webinar: Nonprofit and Library Technology Trends for 2019, Not all information relative to Australia. Points which were the most interesting and time slot as follows: Assistive Technology 35min 30sec, Bleeding edge 38min 25sec database trials, social media lurking on Instagram to explore what libraries are doing,
• NSW State Archives webinars https://www.records.nsw.gov.au/archives/webinars radio show out of library questions, and would be done on a radio show, NYPL has amazing podcast https://www.nypl.org/voices/blogs/blog-channels/podcast
• Proquest and Ebsco training resources
• App – Google photoscan – using your phone – good for mobile scanning
• Adler, Kate, 1979-, (editor.) & Beilin, Ian, 1968-, (editor.) & Tewell, Eamon, (editor.) (2018). Reference librarianship and justice. Library Juice Press, Sacramento, CA https://trove.nla.gov.au/version/257271242 exploring reference services in a broad way as well as collecting
• Following Information online – via online and being able to catch up online- benefits of following things on the twitter
• Noble, Safiya Umoja & ProQuest (Firm) (2018).Algorithms of oppression : how search engines reinforce racism. New York University Press, New York https://trove.nla.gov.au/version/246774575
• Nathan Sentence in terms of how Aboriginal collections are expressed https://archivaldecolonist.com/ Need to think about how to agitate for change to Dewey so that this are better described. (also Adler, Melissa (2017). Cruising the library : perversities in the organization of knowledge (First edition). Fordham University Press, New York https://trove.nla.gov.au/version/244213658)

• Coffs Harbour – new staff, council induction process, then library induction – incudes library tour of three sites, lms training, corporate intranet, opac training (fundamental training), there is a place for strategic ongoing training, weekly staff meeting includes coverage and training of eresources, have an eresource of the month for the public and the month before train the staff so they are ready for the promotion, important to remind people about the things people forget about
• Big Sky – uses the free webinars promoted through NSW.net – is scheduled into people’s rosters, at Regional meetings focus on a particular resource so that people are aware about what is possible, practical training to get people doing things hands on, formal study is also helpful, getting staff to share their skills with new tools is important. Make sure there is a budget for training
• Clarence – training shared between regional library and Grafton, library induction focuses on lms training, and customer service training, use of webinars, book space for the webinars to be done – people rostered to this, have done some reference interview updates, Great managers training through the council has been brought back to the library, important to get new branch staff to spend time in the regional services team so people really understand who does what, rostering to training is crucial, trying to embed professional reading discussions into staff meetings,
• Value of Blue jeans of sessions is raised – being able to participate online is valued
• RUCL – council induction, library induction, and LMS, customer service, fortnightly staff meetings – alternate weeks is in house training, LIAC, databases, IT basics as a lot of IT support is required, staff facebook group to share some resources,
• AL?C – staff doing targeting readers advisory training, technology, as reference libraries, setting up an intranet, staff development days, readers advisory, defibrillator use, library apps
• More staff going through ipad sessions, IT training because of internal staff review

this was accompanied by slides

• Looking at pictures

refcollections_for_grafton.pdf

• Discussion of photographs and services
• Discussion of promotion of sources on websites – making it easier for people to find them
• Different libraries getting different numbers of people asking for information via online forms
• Discussion about providing access to databases, some have many pathways, some one,

presentation here

• Clarence Regional Library infographics, using infographics to convey information about statistics, showing early one with changes from old to new library
• They have a poster, handout and web version
• Much of the data comes from Spydys, people counters, ecr etc
• Also use profile.id to get catchment together
• Using infographics to help to use statistics better and convey the data
• Using Venngage – low cost, not free
• Link to example online for service wide see https://www.crl.nsw.gov.au/about/ and branches see https://www.crl.nsw.gov.au/clarence-valley-libraries/grafton-library/
• Plus also link to the council annual report – see https://www.clarence.nsw.gov.au/cp_themes/metro/page.asp?p=DOC-SYU-25-10-81
• Clarence Valley is going to a lot of infographics for annual reports
• Useful for with staff and with community

Discussion from two people about what were the outcomes. The presentations from Information Online are here

Look for the talks from Mike Jones, Terri Janke, Carla Hayden, practical STEM sessions, and other papers online – benefits of a national conference and being able to talk with other library sectors – papers and keynotes are available at this link

• Discussion about local embedding, and opportunities
• Example of bay end and other in library promotion
• Different resources promoted in newsletter
• Opportunity to add resources into library enews or other online promotion

Discussion about enquiry completion rate – importance of local usage, and of the state wide collection, and the local value of this tracking

specifically as it relates to public libraries - everyone to bring something they have found This is an area for people to watch and provide information about

Send link about wiki joining to managers and pln

People encouraged to join the wiki – to experiment with editing. The wiki is here http://wiki-beta.libraries.nsw.gov.au/doku.php information about how to join the wiki is here http://wiki-beta.libraries.nsw.gov.au/doku.php?id=about_this_wiki

On the shelves and online Slideshow and discussion – discussed earlier in the dayrefcollections_for_grafton.pdf

(website/social media/shelving…) Slideshow and discussion

Note seminar is in May Thank you to Clarence Regional Library for hosting the meeting – it was a lovely location

• Watch Carla Hayden’s talk from Information Online - scroll to her name
• We have been doing embedded librarian things, but we did not have to term for it, important for consistent visibility. Watch Meredith Farkas’s talk is here
• Stories are important, as a way to add to the value of the library – from both Meredith Farkas and Kathryn Breward (infographics)
• The way we present our collection on the shelf is important for findability and accessibility. How do we make our reference collections touchable? Try untidying the collection, or making the clients look (changing the regular)
• How are you investigating the use of the your reference collections online and in the library?

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